SHEBOYGAN – Nearing the end of a four-phase, $6 million expansion, Cascade Cheese Company owner Keith Babler said it's no accident that business is booming.

"If you're making quality, you're not going anywhere," said Babler.

After taking over the Sheboygan area company in 1985, Babler and his family found success focusing on organic provolone and mozzarella, which make up 45 percent to 50 percent of total production.

"We're kind of in a sweet spot ... where we don't have to compete with too many companies because we do things differently than most," Babler said. "When we started with organic, who knew it would take off?"

When Babler and his wife, Betty, first purchased the company, they had four employees and made cheese three days a week. Today, they're up to 30 employees and produce 30,000 pounds of cheese five days a week.

With demand for their products steadily increasing over the years, the Bablers decided that it was time to expand.

They began the first phase of expansion in 2009. During the second phase, the Village of Cascade initiated a tax incremental financing district, or TID, to capture the increase in tax revenue created by the company.

When a TID is created, the base value of the property within a designated area is assessed. When developments like Cascade Cheese Company's expansion occur, the property value increases. The "tax increment" created between the base and the new value is used to pay for infrastructure improvements in the district.

"The TID went live in 2011 and there's about a year or two year delay before you start seeing money come in," said Scott Schramm, an engineering consultant with Strategic Municipal Services of Plymouth.

Schramm estimated that between $6,000 to $10,000 in taxes have been collected by the village from phase two of the project so far.

In 2013, the Bablers began phase three of the expansion, building a new intake for unloading trucks.

The company works with 40 local farmers, as well as larger companies like Horizon and Organic Valley. Most of the milk the trucks bring in comes from within a 45-mile radius, but some of the organic milk comes from as far away as Idaho, Texas and California, Babler said.

The fourth and final phase of the project — construction of a new cheese-making room — is underway and is expected to double production to 66,000 pounds of cheese a day.

As the new system won't require any handling of the cheese, the existing workers will be moved over to packaging.

"There's a lot of hardworking people that make this all happen, from the farmers to the employees that work in the factory," Babler said.

Even though larger companies can produce cheese much more efficiently, Babler's son Justin said the family business is in a good spot in the growing organic market.